Tensions Between Friends
by canny-bairn
Summary: Hotch needs answers after Morgan takes over the Unit Chief role while he spends time with Jack, and old tensions surface between the new team leader and the team's media liaison, threatening the Units latest case.


**Disclaimer – I own nothing related to Criminal Minds**

**So I like to post stories or drabbles that I've had saved on my laptop a little while and usually haven't finished (there are a lot because I write when I'm stuck with my assignments or revision). Honestly, these fics aren't my greatest ever work, they're usually just storylines that I've had in my head and wanted to write but never really got back around to it. Most of the fics were written during or before season 7 so the plot lines differ. **

**I have no idea when I wrote this one, but I know I love when the team is in conflict and I especially like the continuity when there's tension between Morgan and JJ, not that we see that much now, but I hope we do again soon and I hope we find out why there's sometimes tension (like in Mosely Lane) or am I reading into it? **

**Let me know what you think!**

...

It was early in the morning after JJ dropped Henry off at Will's before she found herself stood in the empty elevator, pinching her nose as she felt a sharp pain shoot through her head.

Yesterday had been a long case, without Hotch as he dealt with Jack, his young son who had been venting his grief for his deceased mother by taking his anger out against his schoolmates.

With their unit chief's absence, team leadership automatically went to Morgan who had taken it upon himself to be a monumental ass, the media liaison mused as she stepped off the elevator at the twelfth floor.

It wasn't unusual for the Chicago bon profiler to ruffle a few of the blonde's feathers but this time the team had backed him up and she was left to deal with the fallout.

Morgan had been team leader before and although it had taken some getting used to, JJ accepted the change and things had gone relatively smooth, probably because Hotch was still with them.

However this time it was completely different. Morgan had chosen the case, ordering rather than asking the liaison to do death notifications to seven families while the profilers and his baby girl got on with the case, as he put it.

That wasn't even the main issue, JJ thought as she shoved her office door open. She was used to giving bad news to good people.

What had irked the communications coordinator was that, the temporary chief had then gone over her head and organised a press conference which was simply used to piss a large amount of people off, including a senior police officer with many friends in high places and several senators that Morgan and his merry profiler's of vengeance had decided were aiding their UNSUB in his crimes.

Instead of thinking rationally they acted rashly, causing not only pain to the victim's families, who saw the killer of their loved ones go free but also risked the well achieved name of the elite BAU.

Sitting in her seat, JJ glanced over the pile of case files on her desk before focusing on the neatly stacked pink slips of inter-department notes and call memos that had been left during her time out of the field.

Seeing the familiar handwriting of one slip half way through the pile JJ scoffed. The agents surname was clearly above the capital letters reading: 'WE NEED TO TALK'.

Standing, JJ took off her coat and hung it on the back of the door before making her way to the profiler's office further down the corridor. The echoing of her heels bounced of the greying walls as she took a deep breath, preparing herself for confrontation.

Not bothering to knock, JJ opened the profiler's office door knowing he wouldn't be in so early. Feeling the frustration seep up her chest, JJ took a pen from the holder on the desk and turned over the pink slip she had in her hand. Resting on the desk, JJ put pen to paper before leaving the slip visible in the middle of the desk.

Returning back to the sanctity of her own office, JJ got on with her work, going without her usual third coffee of the day.

An hour or so passed before there was a soft knock on her door.

"Come in." JJ welcomed in strain as she felt her head continuing to pound.

Hotch smiled thinly as he noticed the darkness around his usually composed liaison. "I brought you a tea."

"Thanks." JJ looked up at the supervisor quizzically. "Why?"

"I heard about yesterday." Hotch answered simply.

JJ leaned back in her seat, dropping the pen to her desk as Hotch looked for somewhere to place the mug in his hand. Finding a small clear spot on the cluttered desk, he smirked as JJ replied. "Did Morgan bitch about me already?"

"No, Strauss called me into her office this morning." Hotch responded slowly, taking the seat opposite the Pennsylvanian.

Nodding, JJ bit her lower lip and met his concerned hazel eyes as they sat. "How's Jack?"

"I'm doing my best." Hotch stated sadly, seeing JJ's sympathetic tilt of her head.

Picking up the cup of tea, JJ sighed half heartedly. "We all are."

"So tell me what happened yesterday." Hotch prodded professionally. "You're first in. You get the honours of going first."

JJ looked down to the tea in her cup and shrugged. "I'm not sure I should."

Hotch leaned forward in his seat, his jaw set in the no nonsense manner it often did. "JJ, you got the White Collar team to arrest two senators and the chief of detectives of Maryland PD late last night, after they had already spent the day in custody for the assisted murder of seven people and the disappearance of a Senate aide."

"Does the rest of the team know?" JJ asked hesitantly.

Raising his shoulders indecisively, the profiler watched the blonde's gaze rest anywhere but on his eyes. "I don't know, I haven't spoken to any of them yet. But they will do if they watched the news this morning. Tell me what happened yesterday."

Seeing his resolute, JJ sighed as she put her cup down and moved a lock of fallen golden hair, behind her ear. "Morgan and I don't have the best working relationship at times."

"That's no secret between us." Hotch replied softly, witnessing over the many years a struggle between one of his profiler's and the team's liaison. "He's always felt threatened by your presence since I asked you stay with us."

"I don't think threatened is the word I'd use Hotch." JJ remarked with a small smile.

"Then what would you call it?" Hotch raised an eye at JJ's obvious sunken anger.

Shrugging, JJ chuckled sarcastically. "I don't know, annoyance, maybe."

"JJ he finds it difficult to trust people and he just wants to protect you. You're like a little sister to him." Hotch tried to explain but could see she wasn't excepting his words.

"Hotch, I've had exactly the same training as he has, but he doesn't like the fact that my specialty isn't in profiling and yet I still get to choose the case. He doesn't respect me or my role within this team, he never has. That's fine, I've worked with plenty of people who don't. But he diminishes my role in front of the team and they don't say anything, he acts superior because he's been in the bureau two years more than I have and..." JJ rolled her eyes in frustration as she was interrupted.

Hotch sighed seeing the blonde was hurt. "He doesn't mean to make you feel this way, JJ."

"He has double standards and he always has." JJ began slowly. "Elle and Prentiss were welcomed because they're profiler's. Garcia was instantly embraced by him because she was out of the field and they have the same sense of humour. He didn't agree with me being here, he judged me before he knew me. He saw me as a bureaucratic paper pusher with no right to have a gun or carry out an investigative case and it's stayed with him all of these years."

Hotch took a deep breath as he met her defiant eyes. "JJ, what happened yesterday?"

"He showed up at my office door, telling me we had a case. It hadn't come across my desk and he didn't even brief me before the roundtable meeting." JJ started seeing Hotch's unsure eyes.

Crossing his legs, Hotch rested his elbow on the arm of the chair and leaned his cheek on his hand. "I've done that before."

"That's you Hotch, Morgan isn't exactly the best briefer. He tells us what he wants us to know, keeping details to himself especially if he wants us to go in a certain direction." JJ answered truthfully, knowing full well the unit chief's knowledge of their co worker's strengths and weaknesses as a team leader.

Hotch raised an eye before continuing. "What happened next?"

"We were told a Senate aide was missing since Friday, she was last seen with her boss, Senator Cummings. Morgan asked Garcia to run checks over the victim's and the Senator's phone records. I told Morgan to be careful with whom he was dealing with and he ordered me to go meet the victim's family, which I did." JJ explained as she concentrated on his sculptured face. "While I was gone I got a phone call telling me they had raided a house that was being rented out by another aide, a colleague of the victim, and had been renovated and was owned by, Commander Wiltshire chief detective of MDPD and a friend of Cummings. They had found the remains of seven people near the house on some wasteland."

"So they brought in the aide and Wiltshire?" Hotch asked as he listened intently.

JJ nodded and took another sip of tea before speaking again. "Yeah, the aide was cleared, he had only been in the house a few weeks and lived in Kansas with alibis for the last three years which backed up his statement that he had never been to DC beforehand and the earliest victim had been dead for at least three years. Wiltshire looked good for the murders, but he has a very good defence attorney and a lot of friends in high places."

Hotch nodded and asked another question. "Were you present for the interrogation?"

"No, we got the victim's ID pretty quickly so Morgan once again ordered me to talk to their families. Most of them were in the tri-state area, I was done by seven. But when I got back to the office all hell had broken loose and then I saw it." JJ gritted her teeth.

"You saw the press conference?" Hotch guessed with a hint of amusement in his voice at JJ's obvious anger.

JJ rolled her eyes again. "He didn't even call me, Hotch. I watched the conference tape over and over again and I wanted to kill him. Nothing was tactful about it. He'd called Wiltshire and Cumming's out on the murders. I accept Wiltshire was good for the murders but his attorney had already got him off the charges on no definitive evidence, there was no connection other than the bodies were buried near the back of his house which he rented out to a person we cleared."

Hotch watched the liaison remain composed as he talked. "Is that when you yelled at everyone?"

"No. I took Morgan to the side and asked him to think things over. No judge in their right mind would accept the basically circumstantial evidence we had and we weren't any closer to finding the missing aide because the team were so focused on getting Wiltshire and Cumming's behind bars." JJ explained with emotive hands.

Placing her hands on the desk, JJ forced her mind to slow down as she could feel her emotions getting the best of her. "Hotch, they all had tunnel vision. So, I got everyone together. I went over the facts of the case and suggested that they concentrated on what we knew rather than on the suspects we had. Wiltshire was the UNSUB. I knew he was the UNSUB, but we weren't going to get him on a witch hunt."

"How did they respond?" Hotch asked calmly.

"Morgan got upset at the idea that I was stepping into his territory as leader. Which I wasn't, I just wanted them to take a step back and look at the case form a different perspective." JJ admitted with a sigh.

"You wanted to find a connection between the victims and their disappearances." Hotch concluded.

The liaison nodded and pinched the bridge of her nose. "The cases always come down to the victims. Yes knowing the mentality of the UNSUB is significant but the victims are why do this. But Morgan didn't see it that way. He told me that it wasn't my place to suggest what we should do next because I'm just a liaison. The team went along with his suggestion of continuing with the interrogations. They went too far and the lawyers got the best of them."

"Okay, so how did it end with you yelling at everyone and getting the White Collar Crimes Division involved?" Hotch watched the blonde closely.

"The press conference Morgan held had pissed off a lot of people. Call after call was coming in about how the Bureau going too far. After an irate call from the good Senator Louis from West Virginia, who had been one of many that Rossi and Morgan had annoyed during their little questionings, I went into the bullpen to see the lawyers escorting their clients out of the building. I told Morgan he needed to rally the troops and start again and he bit my head off. I reacted badly and I said some things I shouldn't have about Morgan's emotions getting the best of him." JJ lowered her gaze to her entwined fingers resting on the desk.

"I wouldn't have disagreed with you at that point of the case." Hotch insisted, producing a quirked smile on the liaison's face.

"When I got back to the office, Strauss was in Morgan's office and the team been told to stand down. I got a call from a friend who had worked with Wiltshire. He told me to look in a different direction and I did." JJ watched the profiler raise his eyes at her vagueness. "I asked Kevin to run some things for me and I noticed a lot of money transferred into his infant son's future college fund which could be traced to certain ghost accounts created by some of the Senators aides, so I called Roy at White Collar and got him to follow up."

"They linked fraud and exploitation between Wiltshire and Senator Cummings and Louis to senior members of pressure groups in the city. You did good, JJ." The unit chief praised with a small nod.

JJ met her supervisor's eyes guiltily. "I couldn't get them for the murders or find the missing aide."

A knock on the door interrupted the pair suddenly. Morgan looked between the unit chief and media liaison. "I got your memo."

He held up the pink slip that read 'YOU KNOW WHERE MY OFFICE IS,' which Hotch stifled a chuckle at as JJ stared at the standing profiler, not amused at his presence. "So, you wanted to talk?"

"That was before I saw the news this morning." Morgan replied watching the sitting agents exchange looks. "I assumed you were involved with Agent Grimshaw's sudden interest in the Chief and Senator's."

Hotch watched JJ purse her lips as Morgan leaned against the filing cabinet. Feeling the tension between his two colleagues, Hotch responded to Morgan's accusation. "Well Roy Grimshaw has always been known for his diligence with his White Collar team."

"Hotch, man we were so close to getting them for those killings downtown. If we just..."

The Unit Chief sighed apologetically. "No Derek, the team was taken off the case. Let White Collar do their job."

Morgan turned to leave the office but froe as he tossed the pink slip in the bin. "JJ I know you had reservations but I didn't think you'd go over my head."

"Like you did with me?" She countered.

Hotch stood eyeing the two agents closely. "Okay, guys this needs to be resolved now."

"God, JJ you don't get it." Morgan stressed in frustration.

"No I don't, you're a good leader when you want to be Morgan but..."

"What the hell does when I want to be mean?" He exclaimed angrily.

JJ rolled her eyes in response. "It means you're a great leader when it suits you. When you want to prove that you can be in charge and make the tough decisions, but when there's a case that doesn't take your fancy or you get too emotional, you don't care what the hell happens unless you get your own way."

"I'm the emotional one." Morgan pointed to himself in disbelief.

JJ stared at him warningly. "Don't bring Henry into this again, Derek. You have double standards and you read into things that aren't there."

"What, so you don't get emotional when there're kids involved?" He asked with a glare.

"Don't you? Doesn't everyone on this damn team?" JJ spat back angrily.

Hotch positioned himself in between the two agents with a stormy look on his face. "OKAY, ENOUGH!"

"She started it."

"He's been the ass."

They spoke in unison causing the Unit Chief to groan in annoyance. "JJ I understand why you feel the way you do but you should have called me before you called Roy, as for you," He turned to a smirking Morgan. "You should have listened to what JJ was telling you and worked with her instead of against her. I chose JJ to be the team's liaison and given her responsibilities because she knows what she's doing."

"You put me in charge yesterday Hotch and I did what I had to."

"No doubt about it." Hotch nodded. "But you screwed up when you put your dislike of your suspects in front of the needs of the victims and their families."

Silence overcame the small office after the Unit Chief's solemn words. "Are you two going to shake and make up or do I have to send you both on a consult to Florida?"

JJ stared at Hotch before turning her attention to the other profiler in the room. "I'm sorry you thought I was going over your head Morgan."

Hearing her less than emotive words, Morgan retorted just as dryly. "And I'm sorry for not listening to you and for being rude."

"Are we good now?" Hotch asked them with a raised eye.

JJ and Morgan nodded. "Sure."

"Why don't you go and see if Roy needs any assistance closing the case against your suspects?" Hotch suggested to Morgan who quickly retreated out of the Communications Coordinator's office space.

JJ pursed her lips at her long time colleague. "Florida? Really, Hotch?"

"It worked didn't it?" Hotch shrugged innocently.

JJ scoffed in humour. "Next time you take some time off, please put Rossi in charge."

"Rossi?" The Supervisor raised an eye inquisitively.

"He can be easily manipulated." JJ added with a small smirk.

Hotch chuckled lightly as he edged to the door. "I'll try to remember that."

JJ shook her head at Hotch's relaxed demeanour. "Please do because I don't know if Morgan will survive pissing me off again, any time soon."

...

**Thanks for reading!**


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